Putting a relay team together can be a bit like herding cats. It can be a lot of hard work. Life gets in the way and many adults have to juggle competing priorities. Nikki Pope and Cate Bauer had created three English Channel relay swims in support of Mencap with the aim of raising a lot of money for this great charity along the way.

Two teams were to be kids teams and one an adult team. A space came up, mid season, in the adults team and I was asked if I would join the team and I jumped at the chance.

Some relays and solos go exactly when you expect them to, and some don’t. This one didn’t. We were booked on the 27th August to 5th September tide. For a few days it looked like I’d be doing back to back swims with this swim going at the end of the planned tide and my previous relay going at the beginning of the next one, but we got blown out instead. In the time between that tide and when we did eventually go, we lost two team members to other life priorities and Nikki joined the team (rather than just organise it).

Even until the last few days before we swam it wasn’t clear if we would go. It was a very big tide, apparently the biggest of the season. Should we wait another week for the neap tide? We decided to go. At this point of the season, both air and water temperature is on the decline and it would be a risk to wait, especially if the weather forecast showed wind in that period. We decided to go for it. In my opinion the team was strong enough to handle the big tide.

The team

Let me introduce you to the final team, in the order that we swam.

Before the swim

We’d been on the Dovercoaster for a while, waiting for the opportunity to swim. We knew it was likely to be October as the tides between our one and the end of the season would have swimmers booked onto them. I’ve swum in October a few times before. The big challenge with October is the slowly declining water temperature, long hours of darkness and there can be chilly air temperatures, particularly at night.

We were due to meet at 11:30pm which is a fine time for the swim, it just makes getting rest in advance challenging if you are to avoid trying to pull an all-nighter. Whilst I didn’t have a desperately busy day, just a couple of meetings, I still didn’t find the opportunity to have a nap, mainly due to work going on with the pool. In the end I headed down early evening, had 45 minutes or so of sleep before heading out for a meal with some of the team.

I think I may have been more than a little nervous though. I made myself a flask of tea for the drive down and it takes a while before it’s cool enough to drink. I didn’t think too much about the taste on the first few sips, what I noticed was that it was very hot. But a few more sips and I thought it tasted quite strong and maybe a little bitter, but that could be because it was strong. I was curious, had I left the tea bag in? When I got to Dover, I opened up the flask and yes, I had left the tea bag in. I’d also forgotten to add milk. Like I say, I think I was more than a little nervous!

The meal wasn’t much better. I couldn’t eat much. I felt a little nauseas and had a bit of reflux. Oh dear, what was I doing, beam me up Scotty.

I’d been pleasantly surprised with the air temperature when I’d arrived at the marina, it was fine to walk to the restaurant in just a hoodie. I hadn’t thought that it might rain on the way back, more drizzle really, but enough to get our clothes wet before we even started. This was not ideal. It was what it was though.

No sooner had we arrived back at the marina than it was time to go. We took all our gear down to Sea Leopard where we met Stuart. I had with me a paranoia of warmth. The strangest thing happened, as soon as I set foot on Sea Leopard, my nerves disappeared and I felt calm again. That never happens. Perhaps it was all going to be alright afterall.

The hours of darkness

Anyone who’s read any of my swim reports will have noticed that I don’t like swimming in the dark and at this time of year we have a lot of darkness.

It takes about 30-40 minutes to motor round to Samphire Hoe for the start. Sam was cool as a cucumber and leaped energetically from the boat to do the short swim to shore. She cleared the water, raised her arms and at 00:27 the swim started. Sam swam well, confidently and fast!

Sam handed over to Mark who did the same, strong and fast swimming.

I’ve not swum in UK open water since the last relay at the beginning of September. I’ve swum in Croatia, but that was 24C. I’ve also done plenty of pool swimming, but that was even warmer! I was more than a little bit nervous about declining water temperatures and that combined with cooler air temperature. I watched Sam & Mark with interest - how would they react as they entered the water? How would Sam be when she got out. They both appeared fine which was reassuring.

Time is a funny thing on a swim. I entered the water at 02:27 for my first swim and whilst it was clearly night, it didn’t feel like literally the middle of the night. The water felt cold as I entered but that was only the initial reaction. It was ok. At no point did I feel too cold in the water. That was such a relief.

As I said above, I talk about how I don’t like swimming in the dark, but actually this swim was OK. It was surprisingly OK. Maybe I’m slowly getting over the dark issues. I find that I have to concentrate more to keep a straight line in the dark, but this swim pleasantly surprised me. Time went at about the right pace too, another pleasant surprise. I saw Nikki splash down and it was time to climb back up the ladder. I didn’t feel all that cold when I got out, so I struggled into my next costume and put some of my layers on but by no means all. I probably should have put some more on as I did continue to cool and have a little shiver, but the first hour was done and I’d taken us to the edge of the first shipping lane

Nikki took us into the first shipping lane and finished her hour strongly and we were back to the beginning for the second rotation.

Sunrise was 07:07 which was during my second swim. It starts to get light about an hour before that, but with a cloudy sky we weren’t expecting a spectacular sunrise.

It did indeed start to get light before I got in again, but because of the cloud cover, all that could be seen was a narrow band of orange on the horizon. However, daylight was on its way. It continued to get light as I swam and I remembered the sunrise time so knew that a few minutes after I had been given the half hour sign that the sun would start to appear over the horizon. I could see Nikki taking pictures and I could see a glow out of the corner of my eye, but I resisted the temptation to look up and take a look. It was enough to know that it was there. Nature really is very beautiful.

I had got into the water just before the separation zone and took us into the North East shipping lane. This can be jellyfish alley, but there were none to be seen today.

Soon enough it was Nikki’s turn again and I was out and into my layers. I put one extra layer on and barely a shiver this time. Much better.

The daylight hours

The rest of the swim would be done with the benefit of daylight. It makes everything just a little easier. No need for lights. It’s easier to see the boat and keep a straight line and it’s easier to see people moving about on board.

Earlier this week in masters training we’d been doing some big and tough swim sets and something that our coach, Ivo, had said really worked, and it wasn’t even a comment specifically aimed at me. He’d told us to focus on stretching to the front of the stroke when sprinting. It worked and made a significant difference to my stroke. Whilst I wasn’t going to be sprinting in the pool sense of the word, I did want to give everything that I had for each of my hours in the water. So I focused on stretching to the front of my stroke and putting as much oomph into the stroke as I could. I’m writing this the day after the swim and I can definitely feel the effort that was put in as my lats and triceps are telling me that I have done something!

Nikki, Sam & Mark took us through the majority of the NE shipping lane and I entered the water as we approached ZC2 (the England side of it). We continued our journey south with the tide and where the shipping lane turns the corner by Cap Gris Nez. The tide started to turn whilst I was in the water and I took us to the edge of French inshore water.

Nikki was in the water as the tide turned and it turns spectacularly fast at that point, especially on a tide as big as we had. We were now well into French inshore water.

Land looked tantalisingly close at this point, but it was clear that we weren’t going to make it to the cap, instead we’d go past it and into the bay. Sam & Mark swam their hearts out and there was about 0.5 nautical miles left to go when it was my turn to enter the water. I swam as fast as I could and enjoyed watching Sean prepare the rib and then for that rib to leave Sea Leopard and escort me into the shallows.

There was a bit of surf in the shallows so I decided to swim until it was too shallow to swim as it would be easier to swim than walk. I saw a person standing in the shallows, would it be Patrice? Yes!! It was Patrice. How lovely to see a familiar face at the end of a swim. I cleared the water, turned to face the boat and raised my arms and the adventure was complete.